Steve Duncan

Last updated
Steve Duncan
Alma mater Columbia University
Occupation(s)Urban historian and photographer
Website undercity.org

Steve Duncan is an urban explorer based in New York City. He has extensively explored the New York City sewer system and other tunnels in the New York City area such as the New York City Subway System and Amtrak tunnels that run through the city. [1] Steve has also explored sewers and underground infrastructure around the world. He has explored sewers and tunnels beneath Paris, London, Milan, Rome, Naples, Stockholm, Berlin, Moscow, Montreal, Toronto, Chicago and Los Angeles. [2] He also hosted a television show on The Discovery Channel in 2005. [3] The show aired for five episodes [4] and has since occasionally been aired in syndication.

Steve has been involved in attempting to map current day and historic sewers and tunnels. One of his most recent projects has been to map the development of storm drains in Los Angeles, California. [5]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Los Angeles</span> Largest city in California, United States

Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the most populous city in the U.S. state of California. With roughly 3.9 million residents within the city limits as of 2020, Los Angeles is the second-most populous city in the United States, behind only New York City; it is also the commercial, financial and cultural center of Southern California. Los Angeles has an ethnically and culturally diverse population, and is the principal city of a metropolitan area of 13.2 million people. Greater Los Angeles, which includes the Los Angeles and Riverside–San Bernardino metropolitan areas, is a sprawling metropolis of over 18 million residents.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Urban exploration</span> Exploration of usually hidden or abandoned buildings and structures

Urban exploration is the exploration of manmade structures, usually abandoned ruins or hidden components of the manmade environment. Photography and historical interest/documentation are heavily featured in the hobby, sometimes involving trespassing onto private property. Urban exploration is also called draining, urban spelunking, urban rock climbing, urban caving, building hacking, or mousing.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Storm drain</span> Infrastructure for draining excess rain and ground water from impervious surfaces

A storm drain, storm sewer, surface water drain/sewer, or stormwater drain is infrastructure designed to drain excess rain and ground water from impervious surfaces such as paved streets, car parks, parking lots, footpaths, sidewalks, and roofs. Storm drains vary in design from small residential dry wells to large municipal systems.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bel Air, Los Angeles</span> Neighborhood of Los Angeles, California

Bel Air is a residential neighborhood on the Los Angeles Westside, in the foothills of the Santa Monica Mountains in the U.S. state of California.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gowanus Canal</span> Canal in Brooklyn, New York

The Gowanus Canal is a 1.8-mile-long (2.9 km) canal in the New York City borough of Brooklyn, on the westernmost portion of Long Island. Once a vital cargo transportation hub, the canal has seen decreasing use since the mid-20th century, parallel with the decline of domestic waterborne shipping. It continues to be used for occasional movement of goods and daily navigation of small boats, tugs and barges.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Griffith Park</span> Municipal park in the Los Feliz neighborhood of Los Angeles, California

Griffith Park is a large municipal park at the eastern end of the Santa Monica Mountains, in the Los Feliz neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. The park includes popular attractions such as the Los Angeles Zoo, the Autry Museum of the American West, the Griffith Observatory, and the Hollywood Sign. Due to its appearance in many films, the park is among the most famous municipal parks in North America.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mole people</span> People who live in tunnels underground

In the United States, the term mole people is sometimes used to describe homeless people living under large cities in abandoned subway, railroad, flood, sewage tunnels, and heating shafts.

Columbia University in New York City has an extensive tunnel system underneath its Morningside Heights campus connecting many of its buildings, used by the university as conduits for steam, electricity, telecommunications, and other infrastructure. Throughout their history, the tunnels have also been used for other purposes, mostly centering around transportation. During the first half of the 20th century, they were used by students to avoid aboveground traffic. When the university housed the Manhattan Project, they were allegedly used to move radioactive material between buildings. During the Columbia University protests of 1968, students used the tunnels to facilitate their occupation of buildings on campus.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ballona Creek</span> Urbanized river in Los Angeles, California, United States.

Ballona Creek is an 8.5-mile (13.7 km) channelized stream in southwestern Los Angeles County, California, United States, that was once a "year-round river lined with sycamores and willows". The urban watercourse begins in the Mid-City neighborhood of Los Angeles, flows through Culver City and Del Rey, and passes the Ballona Wetlands Ecological Preserve, the sailboat harbor Marina del Rey, and the small beachside community of Playa del Rey before draining into Santa Monica Bay. The Ballona Creek drainage basin carries water from the Santa Monica Mountains on the north, from the Baldwin Hills to the south, and as far as the Harbor Freeway (I-110) to the east.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sandhog</span> Term for underground construction workers in New York City

Sandhog is the slang term given to urban miners and construction workers who work underground on a variety of excavation projects in New York City, and later other cities. Generally these projects involve tunneling, caisson excavation, road building, or some other type of underground construction or mining projects. The miners work with a variety of tools including using tunnel boring machines and explosives to remove material for the project they are building. The term sandhog is an American colloquialism.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">WNYE-TV</span> Non-commercial independent TV station in New York City

WNYE-TV is a non-commercial independent television station in New York City. It is operated by NYC Media, a division of the Mayor's Office of Media and Entertainment, alongside public radio station WNYE. The two stations share studios at the City University of New York's Graduate Center in Midtown Manhattan, while WNYE-TV's transmitter is located at 4 Times Square.

<i>Food Network Star</i> American food reality television series

Food Network Star is a reality television series that aired from June 5, 2005 to August 5, 2018. It was produced by CBS EYEtoo Productions for seasons 1–8 and by Triage Entertainment for seasons 9-14. It aired on the Food Network in the United States. Prior to season seven, the series was known as The Next Food Network Star.

Paranormal television is a genre of reality television that purports to document factual investigations of the paranormal rather than fictional representations seen in traditional narrative films and TV. Over the years, the genre has grown to be a staple of television and even changed the programming focus of networks like the History Channel and the Travel Channel. By highlighting beliefs in topics ranging from Bigfoot to aliens, paranormal television continues to elevate popular interest in the paranormal.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">KDAY</span> Radio station in Redondo Beach, California

KDAY is a radio station that is licensed to Redondo Beach, California and serves the Greater Los Angeles area. The station is owned by Meruelo Media and airs a classic hip hop format. The station's studios are located in Burbank and its transmitter is in Baldwin Hills. KDAY also extends its signal coverage into the Inland Empire by adding a full power simulcast, KDEY-FM in Ontario, California to fill in all of the overlapping and gaping issues and problems in its eastern coverage area.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Combined sewer</span> Sewage collection system of pipes and tunnels designed to also collect surface runoff

A combined sewer is a type of gravity sewer with a system of pipes, tunnels, pump stations etc. to transport sewage and urban runoff together to a sewage treatment plant or disposal site. This means that during rain events, the sewage gets diluted, resulting in higher flowrates at the treatment site. Uncontaminated stormwater simply dilutes sewage, but runoff may dissolve or suspend virtually anything it contacts on roofs, streets, and storage yards. As rainfall travels over roofs and the ground, it may pick up various contaminants including soil particles and other sediment, heavy metals, organic compounds, animal waste, and oil and grease. Combined sewers may also receive dry weather drainage from landscape irrigation, construction dewatering, and washing buildings and sidewalks.

A vactrain is a proposed design for very-high-speed rail transportation. It is a maglev line using partly evacuated tubes or tunnels. Reduced air resistance could permit vactrains to travel at very high (hypersonic) speeds with relatively little power—up to 6,400–8,000 km/h (4,000–5,000 mph). This is 5–6 times the speed of sound in Earth's atmosphere at sea level.

Erling Kagge is a Norwegian explorer, publisher, author, lawyer, art collector, entrepreneur and politician.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sustainable drainage system</span> Designed to reduce the potential impact of development

Sustainable drainage systems are a collection of water management practices that aim to align modern drainage systems with natural water processes and are part of a larger green infrastructure strategy. SuDS efforts make urban drainage systems more compatible with components of the natural water cycle such as storm surge overflows, soil percolation, and bio-filtration. These efforts hope to mitigate the effect human development has had or may have on the natural water cycle, particularly surface runoff and water pollution trends.

Discover Magazine is a 1992–2000 documentary television series that aired on the Disney Channel from 1992 to 1994 and then on Discovery Channel from 1996 to 2000. The series is named after the magazine of the same name, Discover Magazine. The Disney Channel series was narrated by actor Joseph Campanella. Discovery Channel series was hosted by Peter DeMeo from 1996 to 1998. The series was nominated for an Emmy Award for "Outstanding Informational Series" in 1996, 1997 for "Outstanding Non-Fiction Series", and one other time

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Josh Gates</span> American explorer and television host

Josh Gates is an American television presenter - actor and television producer who hosts and co-executive produces The Discovery Channel series Expedition: Unknown and also Legendary Locations. He is also the host of live specials for, and a guest investigator on, the television series Ghost Hunters and its spin-off Ghost Hunters International. He produces the related Ghost Nation series along with other paranormal television shows through his production company Ping Pong Productions. He was the host and co-executive producer of Destination Truth and Stranded on Syfy.

References

  1. "The Wilderness Below Your Feet". The New York Times . 2 January 2011. Retrieved 18 August 2016.
  2. "Watch "What I've Learned From Exploring Sewers: Steve Duncan at TEDxPhoenixville"". Ted.com. Retrieved 18 August 2016.
  3. "Urban Explorers: Programs: Discovery World: Discovery Press Web". Discovery.com. Retrieved 18 August 2016.
  4. "Discovery Channel: Urban Explorers TV Show". Undercitywebsite.blogspot.com. Retrieved 18 August 2016.
  5. "Academic Work - Undercity.org". 12 May 2014. Archived from the original on 12 May 2014. Retrieved 4 October 2018.